Stein's Childhood
by DarkLiefIsMine
Summary: Stein lived a normal life with a caring mother, a baby sister, and an older brother. That is, until his older brothers drive and passion for dissection gets out of hand and when his older brother strikes, Stein strikes as well, and he lands a blow. His mind becomes corrupted, and insanity takes over. Joins us in this fanfic of insanity and a bit of angst n' pain. I no own Soul Eat'
1. Chapter 1 Good Boy

(Stein's POV.)

I awaken once again, but I do not open my eyes.

 _Stein, what are you doing?_

'Go...go...go away. Get out.' I think.

 _Nope. I'm here to stay._

'Why? What did I ever do to deserve this...maybe my existence in itself is what brought forth this evil. Maybe my soul brought forth you...Maybe I am the evil...Maybe I am you...'

 _Sorry, but I am not ever going to be as low as you and your kind. You disgusting humans._

'Yeah. Humans are disgusting. Sadly I am one. I hate it. I wish I wasn't one. I can't stand my own species, and I can't stand being part of that species. It's a living hell...You know what?'

 _Do enlighten me._

'I don't really hate you. I've actually become quite fond of you over these many years, though I do wish you would stop causing me such pain and such insanity.

You infected my soul with it. You, Mr. Monster, infected my soul with a plague of insanity.'

 _Stein, I thought I told you to call me Demise. That is my name, you know. And anyways, I did not 'infect you with insanity'. You, Franken Stein, infected yourself._

'Yeah. I know that. I just wish you didn't encourage it. I wish you would help me...I wish that someone would care...'

 _I know this is hard to believe, but I do care. I care about you Stein. I'm really sorry that I was so loud and that I hurt you._

Mr. Monster, also known as Demise, says this in such an innocent voice that I want to believe him, but I know for a fact that he is lying. No one could ever care about something like me.

'No. You don't care. You're lying.'

 _Yeah, probably so. But it is quite amusing to see your face when you get all hopeful._

'...'

 _So? Are you ever going to get up. You can't just lie here forever._

'In case you didn't notice, I am tied down. I couldn't get up even if i wanted to. By the way...Never ever scream at me like that again. Those static screams are going to kill me.'

 _That's my plan._

When he says this, I can practically see him, mentally, grinning like a sociopath, which, by the way, he happens to be.

'Shut up or go away. I want to sleep some more.'

 _Not an option. You need to find a way out of here so things can go back to normal._

'Normal meaning what exactly? Me going back to killing everyone and...'

 _Dissecting everyone? Yeah, pretty much. But don't you want to go back to that. Remember how much fun it was?_

'Yeah, it was fun. So much fun. I miss it so much. Maybe we can escape and then we can do it some more.'


	2. Chapter 2 Bad Kid

(Stein's POV(point of view))

"Franken, would you come here a minute," my mutti/mother asks.

"Yes, mother. I am coming. What is it," I ask my dear mother.

"Could you go look after your sister, to see why she is crying," my mutti asks.

"Yes, mother, I will," I say as I walk, to go and check on my younger sister Mila. When I walk into the house, I see that she has fallen out of her crib somehow.

"Oh, Mila, are you alright?" I ask, even though I know she can't respond, as I hold her gently in my arms.

Strangely, I don't think that she could have fallen, and I wonder who did it, if she hadn't fallen out herself.

"Elias, where are you," I call to my older brother. He is 10 years old, and I am only 6 years old, but I am intellectually gifted, compared to him at least.

"Leave me alone," he shouts from his room up the stairs, "Stay away from me!" I carry Mila in my arms, and I walk up the stairs to Elias's room.

"Did you throw her out of her crib, Eli," I ask, trying to keep myself calm, but it isn't working very well.

"Yeah, so what if I did," he asks me, and then I lost it. I would have really done something bad if I wasn't for the infant in my arms.

"What were you thinking," I shout at him, "You could have hurt her...or worse!"

"I don't care," Elias states, and then I race back down the stairs, carefully holding my sister, and I place her back in her crib.

Then I slowly creep back to Elias's room, glad that I had put Mila down. I didn't want her to get hurt or anything.

When I open his door, I see him, scalpel in hand, dissecting a bloody bird.

Then Elias sees me, and he shouts, "Get out of here! Get out!"

I quickly leave, not wanting to be the next victim of my brothers rage, and I take Mila outside.

When my mother asks why she had been crying, I tell her that Mila was just hungry, so my mother goes inside and makes her something to eat. I feel bad for lying to my mother, but it will be safer for everyone, well, almost everyone, if I did.

I wonder why my brother always does the things he does.

Well, I guess that I never will know.


	3. Chapter 3 I Know

(Stein's POV)

I know what Elias is planning to do.

Not exactally, but I know... I can tell, that he is planning something, and something big.

I know that he wants to hurt me, but I am not sure why. Maybe it's just because he's evil. I guess I will never know until it happens.

"Franken, would you come here for a minute," My mutti asks, and I come over to her straight away.

"Yes, Mother. What is it? What do you need," I ask.

"Could you please go take your sister outside, and play with her? She seems awful bored all by herself, and I know that you just always know how to cheer her up, and entertain her," my mutti states happily, and so I take my sister outside.

"Let's play on the grass," I say, and I set her down.

Then she points at something, far off in the distance, and I immedatley know what it is.

"Those are the Cliffs of Mila. They seem to go on forever, because no matter where you are, you can never see the end of them. That is, until you've already reached it," I say to her, and even though she probably can't comprehend it, she seems to understand the sincerity in my words.

Then, night begins to fall, we move inside before the darkness can reach us, and we drift off to sleep.


	4. Chapter 4 I Did

(Stein's POV)

I know what Elias is planning to do.

Not exactally, but I know... I can tell, that he is planning something, and something big.

I know that he wants to hurt me, but I am not sure why. Maybe it's just because he's evil. I guess I will never know until it happens.

"Franken, would you come here for a minute," My mutti asks, and I come over to her straight away.

"Yes, Mother. What is it? What do you need," I ask.

"Could you please go take your sister outside, and play with her? She seems awful bored all by herself, and I know that you just always know how to cheer her up, and entertain her," my mutti states happily, and so I take my sister outside.

"Let's play on the grass," I say, and I set her down.

Then she points at something, far off in the distance, and I immedatley know what it is.

"Those are the Cliffs of Mila. They seem to go on forever, because no matter where you are, you can never see the end of them. That is, until you've already reached it," I say to her, and even though she probably can't comprehend it, she seems to understand the sincerity in my words.

Then, night begins to fall, we move inside before the darkness can reach us, and we drift off to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5 Deadly Little Boy

(Spirit's POV.)

"Lord Death, you wanted to see me?" I ask.

Then Death says, "Yes, I would like you go go on a mission with another group to help them catch a Kishin. I know that you don't have a partner yet, but you could be very helpful for the others."

"Alright," I state, "I will go. Where are we going to? Who am I going to be with?" I ask.

"You will be going to Cheyenne Wyoming, to stop a killer, likely a Kishin, and you will be going with some of the newly transferred EAT class students, Natalie Fisher and Kane Johnston." Death says, and I walk out of the Death Room to find Natalie and Kane waiting.

"Let's go," Natalie orders, I nod, and we traverse to the airport to fly to Cheyenne.

When we finally get there, Natalie searches look for a Kishin soul, but she, the only Meister out of the three of us, can not find one in the city.

Considering this, we wait until nightfall for the killer to strike when he/she usually did.(As we know from the reports.)

At nightfall, we suddenly hear a scream, so we run to the source.

When we get there, the woman who had screamed now lies dead on the ground, as the killer stabs her.

Then the killer starts to laugh like a maniac, and he begins cut her open and pull organs out of the corpse.

"Stop! We have you surrounded! You can't escape," Natalie shouts angrily, almost like a snarl.

Then the killer turns around and Natalie gasps. It is a young boy, only appearing to be a couple years younger then us, maybe ten or eleven.

Then the boy turns away from us as if we aren't even worth his time, and he begins to hack away at his victim once again.

"Stop," Natalie shouts again, but he didn't even look at her.

"Spirit, what do we do?" she asks me, and I say, "I don't know, but I don't think that we should kill him. He is just a kid after all."

"I'm gonna chop you up into little pieces." The boy states matter-of-factly to his victim, and then I declare, "Do not kill him, but we have to stop him."

Natalie and Kane seem to understand, so we make our move.

We surround him, but he doesn't seem to care, or even look concerned, so we come closer.

Then Kane goes behind the boy and is ready to grab him and knock him out, but when he moves his hands, the boy grabs him and seems to shoot out energy from his soul, which I realize, is precisely what he did.

"Spirit," Natalie says, and I transform into weapon form, and she uses me to try to attack him, but he just shoots at us as well, leaving all of us useless on the ground, unable to move.

"I'm gonna' open you up and see how you work. All of you," he says in an amused tone, and then a wicked smile flashes across his face, and he picks up a knife.

"It may not be my scalpel," He says, "But it works all the same."

He is about to slice open Natalie's stomach, when he is hit in the back of his neck by a dart, and his body and the knife fell onto her, not cutting her skin.

Then Sid, a teacher of the EAT class, steps out.

"Are you kids okay?" he asks us, and I say, "Yeah, but we can't move. He...well, I don't know what he did."

"He hit you with energy from his soul, and you should be able to move in a few hours," Sid declares, and then he says, to himself and the unconscious child, "Tsk, tsk, tsk. What do we do with you now?"

Then he picks up the boy and says, "Lord Death had a feeling that you would need some back-up, and I guess that he was right. Wow, I haven't seen something like that in years."

Then he picks up Natalie, Kane, and I, and he carries us all to the airport, and onto a plane bound for Death City.

On the plane, Sid uses a mirror and explains as much of the situation as he can to Lord Death.

Once we get back to Death City, we are carried by staff to the infirmary, and we are placed in beds until we can move again.

The boy was placed in one of the holding cells with restraints, so he can't hurt anyone, including himself, or so I was told by the nurses.


	6. Chapter 6 Language

(Stein's POV.)

I awaken in a strange stone room with chains on my wrists, holding them behind me, and I am filled with fear.

'How did they get me?' I ask myself, 'What are they going to do to me? Will they kill me?'

I am so scared in the small cell, and I want to be out of it so I can breathe.

Actually, I want to be out of this so I can dissect them all. Everyone, to find out how they work.

There is only one light, and it is dim, so it is hard for me to see, but I see that I am alone and that there are no windows.

'Probably to try to keep me from escaping.' I think to myself, 'Good luck with that.'

Then I smirk as I think about all of the ways that I could escape.

Suddenly, I hear footsteps coming from outside of the cell, coming towards me.

I am filled with fear, and my breathing starts to intensify and-when the door opens-it stops all together.

I am in the corner of the room, and so at first the group of people don't see me.

When they do, one of them says, "Lord Death would like to speak with you."

I don't move, though I start to breathe again, and one of them comes over to me.

"Look," he says, and I can tell it is a he because I can now see his face clearly, "We don't want to have to make you come, so why don't you just walk by yourself."

I don't move or say anything, because it seems to irritate him, and I almost smile.

"Fine, we can do this the hard way," he says, and he flashes a toothy, wicked grin.

He yanks me up by my blood covered shirt, jabs his elbows into my ribs, lands a few half-hearted blows on me, and he shoves me forward. One of the other people, a female, grabs hold of my chained wrists.

Then, the people surround me, probably as another way to try to prevent my escape, and we head off to who knows where.

When we arrive, we step in through two doors, and into a large room.

There is a man with a mask, and a few other people there, and I read their souls to see that one is a Shinigami, and the rest are weapons. Lord Death, and his Death Scythes.

"Oh, there he is," Death says in a high pitched, irritating voice, when he sees me.

"So, this is 'The Midnight Monster'?" Death asks.

'Wow,' I think to myself, 'I didn't know that I had a title.'

"Yes, this is the little fucking bastard," Toothy, I named him that after his toothy grin, says.

Then Lord Death chops him on the head, and he falls unconscious to the floor.

"Language," Death says, "We have a child in the room."

Then Lord Death turns away from me, and my heart starts to race as I think about how much fun it would be to dissect him. I grin and I start to chuckle, thinking about how I've never dissected a Shinigami before.

Suddenly, a little buzzer goes off, and Death glances at it.

"This is an alarm set to detect large amounts of madness," Lord Death says, and then he asks me, "What were you thinking about?"

"Dissecting you." I say calmly, still wanting to do it. No matter what, even if I couldn't, I would still want to.

"That sounds painful, so I think I'll pass, but maybe some other time," he says, and I smirk, sensing his sarcasm.

Then I remember how fun it was to dissect and kill, and I smile, and the alarm goes off again.

"The state gave us custody of you, considering that you are a Meister," Lord Death says, and I don't say anything, so he continues. "We can't just let you run free and kill, so I decided that we are going to try to help you. Franken Stein, will you let us help, or do we have to make you let us help?"

"I don't want your help," I say, "I don't need to change. I'm fine. Kill me if you'd like, I don't care. I'll be a psycho killer either in heaven or hell. Dissecting angels or demons, I can't decide which sounds more entertaining."

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. I had hoped that we wouldn't have to do this." Lord Death says.

"We are going to make you change." Toothy says as he's coming back to his senses, and consciousness.


	7. Chapter 7

(Spirit's POV.)

"Lord Death would like to speak with you, Spirit." Sid says.

I nod my head, and I walk out of 'Class Crescent Moon' and go towards the Death Room.

When I walk in, I see Natalie and Kane, and I ask Lord Death, "You wanted to see us, sir?"

"Yes," He says, "I wanted to talk to you three about the Cheyanne killer. He is in a holding cell right now, and we are wondering what to do. He says that he doesn't want our help, and that he doesn't want to change. Do any of you have any ideas? We really don't want to... force him to change, but if we don't think of something fast, we may have no other option then... reeducation."

I shiver at the mention of the terrifying method, that had been whispered through out the halls, that had been used long ago to help enemies "change".

"Yes, we wouldn't want to resort to that." Natalie says, and it is apparent that she is just as terrified about the subject as me.

Kane doesn't say anything, like usually, but he looks sort of disturbed, and also a bit scared.

No one seems to have any ideas, and Lord Death is about to dismiss us, but then Kane comes up with a simple, but genius plan.

"Why don't we expose him to other children, and monitor his madness, and then we can work from there." Kane says.

"Yes, that might just work, but we have to be very, very careful. We don't want any dead bodies, and with him around, that won't be likely." Lord Death says.

"I think that we should wait a couple of days, at least, for him to, "adjust" before exposing him to normality." I say, worried for all of the other children's sake.

"Yes," Lord Death says, "We should wait three days, and then we will begin."


	8. Chapter 8

(Stein's POV.)

I awaken once again in the strange cell, with a pain in my ribs.

I haven't seen daylight in quite some time, but that doesn't bother me, because I never really liked the light anyways, so I am used to it being dark, like it is now.

After a while, I become bored, so I start to think about everything.

I think about dreams that I have had, nightmares too, and I think about all of my dissections, remembering every one to perfect detail.

The looks on their faces as they died, I loved seeing those looks, and I will likely forever remember them all.

After what seems to be hours later, or maybe minutes or days, I hear footsteps coming down the hall.

Then, someone knocks on the door and says, "Can I come in?"

I don't respond, so the person opens the door, and they appear to look around for me.

When the person, a man, sees me, he says, "Oh, there you are."

I once again do not respond, so he asks, "Why are you not speaking?"

Then I smile as I think about dissecting him, and an small alarm goes off.

The man pulls it out of his pocket, and looks at it, and I see that it is like the one that Death had in his Death Room, only smaller.

"You were thinking about dissecting me, weren't you?" The man asks, and he chuckles lightly.

Then he says, probably mostly to himself, "Yeah you were. Are you hungry?"

Then I whisper darkly, "Yes, hungry for blood."

"I don't think that's on the menu, but I can check." Then man says, and then he chuckles again, and I decide to call him Chuckles.

"I wonder if you're really as bad as they say you are. They say that you're a cold-blooded murderer who loves it, but I wonder if that's true." Chuckles says.

I don't say anything, and he doesn't ask about it again, so I start to, almost, form somewhat of a liking towards him.

Then I smile and think about dissecting the whole world, except for Chuckles and myself, and I wonder what he would think of me then.

The little alarm goes off again, but he doesn't say anything.

"Are you going to say anything?" I ask, bored, finally breaking the silence.

"Maybe," He says, "I'm just thinking, wondering, about you."

"I mean, how could a little kid like you do what you've done?" He asks, and I think about it. "You must have a reason. I don't think that you would do what you did just to do it, so if there is a reason, tell me. Please? I want to know." He pleads.


	9. Chapter 9

(Lord Death's POV)

"You must have a reason. I don't think that you would do what you did just to do it, so if there is a reason, tell me. Please? I want to know." Professor Kinley pleads.

I have been waiting for this moment, hoping that I might learn some of this killers background, so I can help him, and I had been listening to them talk for a while, through a listening device that Kinley has brought with him.

"Actually, you really don't want to know." Stein says.

"I do. Tell me, please." Kinley says.

"It was nothing." Stein says, and then Kinley asks, "Oh, so you do have a reason?"

"Yeah, I guess." Stein says.

"Well, what is it? Tell me already." Kinley says.

Suddenly, a small sound is made, as if someone were putting their head in their hands, and then as if someone were patting someone on the back softly.

I read between the lines, and then I decide to go to my mirror, for Stein's cell also had a mirror, and I saw Stein curled in a ball on the edge of the bed, and Kinley was patting him on the back.

"What happened to you, Stein?" Kinley asks, prying for information.

Then, tears begin clawing their way out of his eye sockets, rolling down his face.

"It was a couple of years ago, in my home town. My brother..." Stein says.

"Well?" Kinley asks.

"He did some bad stuff, and though I never really knew why, we grew distant. I never really knew, but he was slowly growing to hate and despise me." Stein says.

How interesting. I guess that even a killer has, or well... had, a family.

Stein says, "Lance... that was his name, and he loved to take things apart, living things. Dissecting was just his thing, and he never wanted to stop."

Now that I think about it, I guess that Stein might have just acquired that strange trait of dissecting his prey from his brother.

"He dissected birds, bugs, and anything that was alive. I thought that it was okay, until he did it with humans." Stein says.

"Oh, and who were these humans?" Kinley asks.

"My sister and my mother were both brutally slaughtered by Lance while I was asleep, and when I woke... I found both of their mutilated corpses. I was a child at the time, and I killed him. I did what he did to them, but back at him this time." Stein says sadly, almost as if he wishes that he hadn't.

Well, I can understand why he would wish that.

"I dissected him and I made him pay for his sins. After that, I had realized how much fun it was to kill and dissect, I continued to dissect or kill everyone who crossed my path, for I wanted to find out how they worked." Stein says, and the sadness slowly drained from his face, turning into a look of madness.

"So... that's why." Kinley says, "I guess I see why you did it. I hope that I can help you, to change, I mean."

"I don't want your help. Look, I'm sorry, but I don't want to change. It's fun." Stein says, and he grins like a mad man.

"Stein, I am saying this as someone who cares about you." Kinley says somberly, "You need to change. If you don't, you will just suffer, like you are, forever."

Then, Stein laughs manically, and he starts to rock back and forth in his little ball.

"I'm not suffering from insanity. I'm enjoying every minute of it." Stein says, "I just don't understand why you all think I need to change, because guess what? I don't."

"Stein, you just don't seem to get it. I have to help you, and you have to change." Kinley says, obviously not knowing what to do or say.

I am becoming nervous, hoping that I will not have to intervene. If worse comes to worse, I can restrain the boy and force "re-education", but I hope that I won't have to force anything on the boy.

I, Lord Death, am not one to enjoy the methods that I used in previous times to force my enemies, and such other people, to change, not always for the better.

Stein suddenly laughs like a psychopath once again, and I look in the mirror to see Stein still in a ball, and Kinley is looking at him with concern.

Then Stein raised his hand towards Kinley, and the madness device buzzed loudly.

Kinley was thrust backwards as Stein shot him with a large amount of energy from his soul, and Kinley cried out in both shock and in pain.

Stein shot him again, and Kinley lost consciousness, so I raced to Steins cell to stop what might happen.

When I get there, blood covers Kinley's body, and Stein is standing above him, holding the same knife that Kinley himself happened to have on him, ripping Kinley apart and pulling out a few organs.

"Stein, stop this." I say calmly, though I know that even if he wants to, he can't, for the madness has consumed his soul.

He doesn't even look at me, and I rush over to him and restrain him. He tries to break free by shooting me with Soul Energy. (The name for the energy that Stein shoots from his soul.)

"Feisty little one, aren't you." I say, as a statement, not a question, and he laughs and continues to try to shoot me, and though it actually does annoy me, I hold him still.

Finally, I make it so that he can not move at all, except for breathing and blinking of course, and I bind Stein at the wrists and ankles so he can't continue to injure Kinley.

After Stein is taken care of, Kinley becomes my first priority, and I rush him off to the infirmary.


	10. Chapter 10

(Natalie's POV)

"Oh my Shinigami." Spirit says, "Natalie, hurry. Come with me. Lord Death wants to see us."

Spirit grabs me by the arm and starts to pull me along with him and Kane.

"Wait," I say, and then I ask, "What in the world is going on?"

"I don't know, but what I do know is that it is urgent, and that Lord Death wants to see us, now." Spirit says, as we race down the hall towards the Death Room.

We push the doors open, and we see Lord Death staring into his mirror with a strange expression on his face.

"You wanted to see us, sir?" Kane asks quietly.

"Yes, I would like to discuss with you about the child." Lord Death says, "He attacked Professor Kinley when they were talking, and he lost it. Right now, we have him bound and gaged in a different cell, and we are honestly running out of options. If this is how he reacts around adults, imagine how he will react around children."

Then Lord Death sighs and says, "I honestly think that we might have to force re-education on him. We can't put anyone's safety at risk."

"Is re-education the only option?" Spirit asks, and Lord Death nods his head grimly.

"I'm afraid that we have run out of safe things to try, and when I say safe, I mean for others. Re-education will most likely work, but it won't be pleasant." Lord Death says, "Come with me."

Lord Death leads us down the stairs and towards the cells, and we stop at one.

Then, he opens the door and let's us look in.

"Oh my Shinigami-san!" Spirit whispers in shock, staring at the scene before him.

Stein is on the floor, unconscious, chained to the wall and gaged, most likely for everyone's safety, including his own.

"I see why you have him chained, but why gaged?" Spirit asks.

Then, Lord Death says, "He woke up a while ago, and when he did, he started to scream and bite himself like a mad man."

"Oh." I say.

Lord Death sighs and says, "I really don't know what to do anymore. I don't want to have to force him, but what other choice do we have?"

None of us seem know, so we don't say anything, and Lord Death dismisses us back to our classes.


	11. Chapter 11

(Stein's POV)

I wake to find myself chained at the wrists and gagged in a dark cell, and I ponder over why I am here.

After a moment of thinking, suddenly, all of my memories flood back into me, and I stifle a gasp as they rush throughout me.

The memory of the most recent event, that I was conscious for, sends a shudder down my spine.

The madness, it had consumed me completely, and I had, and have, no control over it whatsoever.

I heard footsteps coming towards me, and from what I can tell, it was one person walking at a leisurely pace.

The door opens, and someone comes in. I can not see this person's face because they are wearing a surgical mask, but I can see that it is staring at me.

It stares at me, cocks its head to the side, and then stares at me some more.

He is completely silent. Deafeningly silent...

Due to his anonymousness, I have chosen to name him/her Mr. Silent and refer to him as a male.

Mr. Silent has a box with him, and he opens it... slowly, only adding to my curiosity.

What is in the box? I must know! Only once he has taken something out of the box, do I wish I hadn't needed to know. Ever.

Mr. Silent takes out a scalpel, along with a vial of some sort of liquid.

He comes over to me and takes off my gag, which I mentally thank him for, and forces the vial into my mouth. I struggle and squirm, like a worm on the ground. It appears to be pointless, but then I knock the vial out of his hand, and it crashes to the floor.

smiles, and then he pulls another vial with the same liquid, and despite my struggles against him, I wind up swallowing the liquid anyways.

He puts the vial back in the box and then...everything around me starts to get darker...and darker...until I am completley consumed with darkness.


	12. Chapter 12

(Mr. Silent/Professor Grey's POV)

I carry the unconscious boy out of the cell, where he was being held, and take him down to the infirmary, where I will check him over for injuries. I set Franken Stein on the hospital type bed, and pull off his tattered blood covered shirt.

Multiple lacerations cover his torso and arms, along with claw and teeth marks, scars, and bruises. Based upon his mouth and teeth size, the bites most likely come from him. Also, considering his broken, jagged nails, I believe that it would be safe to assume that the claw marks also come from himself.

"Oh, so he's 'that' kind of insane," I say aloud in a somber tone, and a pang of empathy hits my heart with a jolt. I remember back when I was like him. Insane to the marrow, but not yet to the bone cells, yet the infection of insanity had already conquered my mind, and I was almost beyond salvation. I only hope that, alike to me, he can be saved.

I turn the boy onto his stomach and I see a small, but severly infected laceration, and I begin to work. I cut out the infection carefully, and then I stitch it up. I turn him on his back again, and I stitch up his other wounds.

I then check him over from the hips down, and I see that he has scars and lacerations on his calves and thighs, and I stitch and clean those.

Once the child is patched up I inject him with quite a bit of highly effective sedatives, and I call for another nurse and have her wash the boy. When he is clean, we dress the unconscious little killer in clean clothes, and move him to another bed, so we can wash the other one that is now dirty.

We set him on the bed and the other nurse excuses herself, and I restrain his hands and ankles to the metal rails on the bed, keeping his nails and hands a good distance away from any flesh that he could, and most likely would try to, rip and claw at.

When I am certain that he is secure, I contact Lord Death through a mirror and I inform him of the child's state.

I then traverse to my office in the infirmary, and I start going through a pile of paperwork. I get through half of my very large stack, and then I hear grunts and uneven breathing.

I go over to the source of the noise, and I see that Franken Stein is starting to awaken.

His eyelids flutter open, he squints at the light, and then he gasps. His eyes are glassed over, and he appears to be unable to control himself.

He tugs roughly against the restraints and he starts to hyperventilate. The little boy screams out and pulls harder and harder against the restraints, his head whipping up and down against the soft mattress, and then he tries to smash his head against the metal bars, but his restraints immobilizing him.

He screeches again and again, and then he starts to move his head in ways that could potentially break his neck. He thrashes and screams, whipping his head, and then I pin his head against the mattress with my hands covering his ears on either side.

The little child's jaws snap again and again, and then he starts to scream louder and louder, and then I see blood drip from the corners of his mouth. The little boy clamps his jaws shut on his tongue, again and again, appearing relived to have found a solid purchase of flesh to attack.

He starts to scream again, though, this time, it is a scream of terror. Agony, rage, pain, and terror. Those are the only emotions that his screams convey.

"Stein? You have to listen to me Stein. You need to snap out of this. Can you hear me?" I ask.

His screams suddenly come to a halt, and I slowly take my hands off of his ears.

"No..." he moans, "t-t-too..."

"Too what Stein? What is it?" I ask with genuine concern.

"No! Too- TOO LOUD! Ahhh!" the little boy screeches, and his back arches, "Too loud! It's too loud! Make it stop! Make them stop...make them-"

I cut him off by clamping my hands of his ears once more, and he stares up at me with his dead, glassy eyes. Tears roll down his face, and he whisper, "T-t-too..."

"Is it gone?" I ask, and he shakes his head.

"Make it stop," he whispers, and then he says something that develops into a scream as he speaks, "Stop. Stop. Stop! Make them stop! It's too loud!"

He screams again and again, shrieking with agony convulsing and twisting around, though the restraints allow less movement.

I pull out a needle, catch his arm, and jab it in. Ever so slowly, he fades into consciousness.


End file.
